Mapping Urban Intervention in Los Angeles March 3 – April ... · installation, Tree Baby (2007-ongoing), is a part of his ongoing Sick-Amour project (2005-ongoing)(see fig. 3, 4),

Mapping Urban Interventionin Los Angeles March 3 – April 17, 2011

Los Angeles, in particular, is rather like a big earthworm that might be

chopped into twenty pieces without being killed…you get the impression

that a medium-sized urban center has schizogenetically reproduced itself

twenty times…1

Jean-Paul Sartre, 1945

How is one to understand and interact with the postmodern urban phenom-ena known as Los Angeles? Assuming that geography, culture, society and economy are all terms by which we understand a city, how are we to con-nect them all in order to understand art’s place within its terrain? The Plains of Id: Mapping Urban Intervention in Los Angeles engages these questions by focusing on contemporary artists who intervene within a specific area of Los Angeles’ sprawling topography. The title of the exhibition derives from Reyner Banham’s seminal book, Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies (1971). One of the first scholars to take the city seriously, Banham analyzed L.A. urbanism and categorized the most distinctive part of the city as the Plains of Id. Performing socio-political art and action within this specific section of L.A., artists Sandra de la Loza, Patrick “Pato” Hebert, Joel Tauber, and the artist collective Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, and Austin Young) open a range of accessibility to the city and its resources. By synthesizing aesthetic theories spanning from conceptualism

to feminism and employing strategies influenced by activism, the artworks featured in this exhibition revise forms of activist art to both critique and pay homage to previous models. Employing L.A. as a vehicle to understand broader issues of urbanism, the artists are indebted to Banham and his efforts to draw attention to a city that in the past was perceived as vacuous and culturally insignificant.

A Culturally Legitimized Los Angeles

Prior to the 1970s only a few scholars considered Los Angeles a plausible subject for architectural, urban, or cultural analysis.2 In contrast, Banham’s text celebrated the structure of the city, categorizing it into four “ecolo-gies”: Surfurbia, the Foothills, Autopia, and the Plains of Id.3 The latter are the flatlands from Downtown to San Pedro, which Banham defines as the Id of the city.4 Distinct to L.A., yet simultaneously characteristic of so many American cities, this location is where L.A. best expresses its “Anywheres-ville/Nowheresville” city identity—embodying the essence of every city, yet distinguishable in its nuances.5 For Banham, the Plains of Id were the quintessential component that defined the city because it was an expanse typified by a particular type of urban homesteading, the architectural style of “dingbat” apartment complexes.6 He characterized this area as “the only parts of Los Angeles flat enough and boring enough to compare with the cities of the Middle West.”7

Mapping Urban Interventionin Los Angeles

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Although Banham desired to legitimize L.A. and celebrate its exceptional qualities, he did not sufficiently recognize the intricacies of its vast sprawl-ing flatlands. A year later art critic Peter Plagens challenged Banham’s perspective in Artforum, stating that he was an outsider who posited an oversimplified analysis of the city. Plagens contended that Banham’s analysis was similar to other architectural literature that “ignore[d] the daily grind, the millionfold smalltime commercial transactions, the lives of the work-ers and shopkeepers, police and criminals, housewives and teachers, and unemployed and elderly.”8 Plagens argued for an analysis that addresses the socio-cultural climate of the city. Consequently, studies of L.A. would focus on the complexity of the city’s urbanism along with its seemingly fragmented configuration.

These studies came to the fore in the late twentieth century with the formation of the Los Angeles School, a loose aggregate of scholars who focused on issues of urbanism pertaining to the city of L.A. 9 Despite lacking a unified methodological approach, their dialogues revolved around the notion that the region was “symptomatic of a broader socio-geographic transformation taking place within the U.S. as a whole.”10 One of the scholars, Michael Dear, emphasized the difference between L.A.’s structure and the European city model, the latter consisting of one definitive city center expanding outward concentrically.11 In contrast, L.A. developed from a polycentric network of multiple disjointed communities. Richard Weinstein, also of the L.A. School, notably named L.A. “the first American city” because its urbanism was rooted in the ideas of an American Dream offering the promise “of a good life outside the squalors of the European type of city.”12 As a model for the American city, L.A. became the focal point of a postmodern urbanism—a city rich with socio-cultural issues and, thus, also a subject and field for complex artistic investigation.13 As catalyst for these investigations, Banham’s scholarship instigated dialogues about L.A. urbanism, which led to theorists and artists using it as a field of socio-political inquiry. The artists in The Plains of Id utilize activist methods in the city, addressing issues fundamental to its urban structure.

One of the main concerns in curating an exhibition around urban interven-tion is that the museum setting tends to deactivate art’s social function. Originally these types of socio-political projects are meant to function within a community, offering its members access to communicative tools that were previously hidden. Taking such work out of its real world context and displaying it as an aesthetic art object removes it from its utilitarian function. In order to keep these operations active, The Plains of Id is an exhibition that takes place both within the museum setting and outside its institutional walls. Pointing the viewer outside of the conventional exhibition space, The Plains of Id exposes the relationship between the work and its subsequent impact on the community. We hope that this curatorial methodology allows the activist approaches of each artist to remain dynamic.

The Plains of Id Artists: Playing with the Possibilities of Intervention

Working within L.A. as a site of investigation, the Pocho Research Society (PRS), conceived by Sandra de la Loza, addresses issues of assimilation, identity erasure, and displacement caused by officiated power structures. As the sole official member of the PRS, de la Loza places unauthorized mock historical plaques in various locations throughout L.A. as part of her series, Declared Invisible Monument, which includes three defined bodies of work entitled: The Displacement of the Displaced (2002), The Triumph of the Tagger (2002), and Echoes in the Echo (2007). These “monuments” commemorate erased histories in L.A. Each plaque features a descriptive account of an event or an explanation of the significance of the site where it is placed. De la Loza’s subversive placement of the plaques triggers their inevitable removal by city officials. Her photographic documentation of the plaques in situ raises questions about the ownership of history. In the Pocho Research Society: Echo to Echo Installation (2007, reinstalled 2011 for The Plains of Id) (see fig. 2) this documentation is used to map the specific sites of her interventions.

2 Pocho Research Society Pocho Research Society: Echo to Echo Installation, 2007, reinstalled 2011 From the series Operation Echoes in the Echo Xeroxed maps, vinyl letters, photos, mixed media Dimensions variable © Sandra de la Loza

Detail, fig. 2

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While de la Loza uses guerrilla tactics, Patrick “Pato” Hebert engages in collaborations with local communities via gatekeepers, such as the staff of public institutions or municipal departments. His artwork is aligned with them, but often critically questions their motives toward the local com-munity. In Hebert’s installation, Resilient Concerns (2011, see similar instal-lation, fig. 5), he first encouraged students, staff, and faculty to respond to the open-ended prompts, “I’m resilient____” and “I’m concerned_____.” These responses, handwritten on over six hundred yellow and black con-struction flags, were collected and edited by Hebert. He then collaged the responses into an indoor vinyl wall installation. For the duration of the ex-hibition the initial flags are positioned on the lawn in front of the University Art Museum (UAM) at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB).

Also utilizing the outdoor area of the UAM, Joel Tauber’s permanent installation, Tree Baby (2007-ongoing), is a part of his ongoing Sick-Amour project (2005-ongoing) (see fig. 3, 4), which chronicles his intervention to save a California Sycamore tree stuck in the Rose Bowl Stadium Parking Lot K.14 Prior to his project, the tree was starved for nutrients by the surround-ing asphalt, attacked by pests, and hit constantly by cars. Tauber began caring for the tree as a symbolic gesture: watering it, building guards to protect it from cars, and then eventually persuading the City of Pasadena and the officials at the Rose Bowl to preserve the tree. The four videos in the exhibition document various stages of Tauber’s project. As a continua-tion of Sick-Amour, approximately two hundred tree babies (seedlings from the original tree) have been cultivated, many of them adopted and planted in public locales throughout California.15 In collaboration with Tauber’s project, the CSULB Museum Studies Program adopted a tree baby for the grounds at the university, planted on March 9, 2011.

Similarly, the artist collective Fallen Fruit confronts issues concerning the lack of community engagement in urban spaces. They use fruit as a tool for their investigation into community and ideas of neighborhood. Their Public Fruit Maps project (2004-ongoing) (see fig. 7) charts the location of edible fruit growing or hanging over public spaces.16 As part of their continued effort to readdress issues of accessibility to natural resources, they have

mapped locations ranging from their own Silverlake neighborhood to other areas, including Sunset Junction, Echo Park, and Larchmont, as well as vari-ous locations internationally. In order to create these maps, the members of Fallen Fruit physically survey fruit trees that would otherwise be mistakenly considered inaccessible because the roots of the tree stem from private property. As an extension of this project, Fallen Fruit creates Neighborhood Infusions (2008-ongoing) (see fig. 8), which are vodka drinks flavored using collected public fruits and named after the neighborhoods in which they were picked. For the exhibition, Fallen Fruit has created a fruit map of a section of Long Beach, a city that also falls within the Plains of Id. Like all the artists in the exhibition, Fallen Fruit extracts, maps, points out, and questions, accessibility to resources or modes of connectivity that the city has to offer.

Visual Cues of Intervention: Rethinking Utopian Models

The artists in The Plains of Id utilize the aesthetic of intervention (plaques, handwritten signs, gatherings, and documentaries) in order to question the nature and effectiveness of previous models of art and activism. This historical paradigm called for upheaval and total reconstruction of society and originated in a Modernist utopian framework.17 For example, artist groups such as the Situationist International (SI) (1957-1972) combined art and politics to confront the alienation caused by the rise of consumer capitalism.18 While the SI and similar artist groups aimed to incite social revolution, ultimately their goal proved too idealistic and far-reaching to truly reform society. Aware of this and other shortcomings, contemporary artists strategically employed activist art conventions in the belief that they can still be effective social instruments. For instance, alliances such as the AIDS Coalition To Unleash Power (ACT UP) in New York reacted to the AIDS crisis of the late 1980s and realized the importance of visual media in order to implement change around a very particular cause.19

The Plains of Id positions the artists within this trajectory, acknowledg-ing the significance of activism and responding to its historical limitations. Artists groups such as ASCO (1972-1987) in Los Angeles developed their

3 Joel Tauber My Lonely Tree, 2006 Lightjet print mounted on aluminum 56 x 71.5 in. © Joel Tauber

4 Joel Tauber July 30, 2007: The tree is protected by a boulder barrier!!!, 2007 Lightjet print mounted on aluminum 20 x 30 in. © Joel Tauber

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aesthetic by paying homage to, and at the same time questioning, the socialist agenda of the Mexican Muralist Movement of the 1920s-1940s.20 Art historian Claire Bishop argues that artists of the current generation reject the goals of revolutionary art practices and instead seek “provi-sional solutions in the here and now.”21 Their critical stance toward utopian models allows them to avoid the grandiose gestures of their predecessors. Instead, the artists in this exhibition seek to create small disruptions that remain politically and socially significant to the individual. Rather than aim for monumental social shifts, their artworks intervene on a smaller scale, demonstrating how reaffirming an individual’s sense of agency can be an effective means to create change. To this end, they embody an aesthetic of visual cues of intervention—walking the fine line between actual activism and referencing in a satirical manner the revolutionary models of the past.

Cognitive Mapping: A Positioning Tool for the Individual

Arguably, the artworks in The Plains of Id function as vehicles of interpre-tation—a way in which to read and further comprehend the structures of society.22 Engaging in a process called cognitive mapping, the artists imple-ment strategies that provide the viewer access to the unknowable totality of the city by visualizing it as an allegory.23 Preeminent Marxist/cultural theorist Fredric Jameson cites films about conspiracy theories as visualized cognitive maps.24 A conspiracy film, like Oliver Stone’s JFK (1991), functions as an allegorical interpretation of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. Since government agencies could not produce sufficient answers, Stone’s film provides a desired resolution and comfort to the viewer by using tech-niques of fiction to reduce anxieties surrounding the actual assassination.

In regard to the complex structures that characterize postmodern urban metropolises, Jameson argues that they are too vast for the individual to immediately comprehend; the cognitive map then functions as a bridge between subjective experience and objective reality (the totality of the city). Thus, cognitive mapping is a method by which individuals can acquire a better understanding of the global system in which they live.25 The artists in The Plains of Id construct cognitive maps of L.A. for the individual. By

offering viewers the tools to position themselves within the city, the artists reintroduce the possibility of empowerment, which allows the participant to have an active role within their community.

The Plains of Id: Artists Activating Communities in Los Angeles

In a similar operation to Jameson’s example of conspiracy, Sandra de la Loza’s PRS challenges the authority of official history. By engaging with neighborhoods that have been usurped by an affluent class, the Echoes in the Echo series exposes the double gentrification of Echo Park’s Hispanic gay bars.26 Mimicking official historical tone, de la Loza’s PRS uses the pretext of a scholarly organization to question issues of authenticity.27 The plaques produced for this series appropriate the historical monument aesthetic and expose the erasure of already marginalized narratives in L.A.28 Her decision to label the plaques as monuments mimes authoritative agency associated with memorializing a significant historical event. Through this disruption, de la Loza reveals what collective memory often suppresses, pointing to the undemocratic hierarchies that impact how histories come to be written.

De la Loza’s strategy to convey these unearthed histories on public plaques visualizes Jameson’s process of cognitive mapping because the “monuments” signify larger socio-cultural issues. By narrating personal accounts from patrons of former bars such as The Score and Le Barcito, the plaques in Echoes in the Echo (see detail fig. 2) expose the effects of gentrification on the individual. The revisited histories are a tool that helps viewers understand L.A. as symptomatic of a broader post-modern condi-tion. Her installations are a lens in which to recognize and track significant shifts in the urban structure of the city. Through her work, viewers adopt a more active role within their community to counteract these shifts.

Hebert’s Resilient Concerns uses yellow and black construction flags that are employed for marking off sections of terrain for practical purposes. He reinvents their function by adopting them as modes and markers for an individual to express his or her personal feelings. By placing the installation in a high traffic area of campus, he compels the students, faculty, and staff to interact and congregate around the flags and each other. By appropriating

5« Pato Hebert Intentional Grounding and Trying to

Catch Your Breath, 2010 Outdoor installation with red and yellow construction flags Installed at Swarthmore College Dimensions variable © Patrick Hebert

6 Pato Hebert Resilient Concerns (detail), 2011 Outdoor installation with black and yellow construction flags Located on the CSULB, UAM lawn dimensions variable

© Patrick Hebert

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8» Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) Neighborhood Infusions, 2009 Installation containing six bottles of infused vodka on a wooden shelf 3.75 in. by 2.88 diameter © Fallen Fruit

7 Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) Public Fruit Maps, 2004-ongoing Dimensions variable © Fallen Fruit

the visual strategies of advertising and quotidian signage, Hebert counters ubiquitous commodity oriented messages that permeate society. Similar to the artist coalition Gran Fury (the “propaganda” branch of ACT UP) that appropriated advertising techniques to respond to the AIDS crisis, Hebert utilizes signage conventions and reclaims them for educational purposes.29 The installation, however, is not trying to revolutionize interpersonal com-munication on campus, but rather attempts to disrupt its conventional visual landscape. Arresting the attention of the public, the enormous ag-gregate of flags creates the potential for dialogue.

This installation gives the individual a platform in which their voice can be heard. The responses contained within it reflect both the general and the idiosyncratic qualities of the complex network that is the campus com-munity (see fig. 6). Following the exhibition’s opening, visitors were able to add to the installation. Hebert relinquished control, allowing the responses to grow and morph into an entity that is contingent on the viewer. Inside the UAM, he de-contextualized some of the messages by reconfiguring them into a vinyl collage on one of the walls, creating a matrix of juxtaposed statements. The personal messages both inside and outside the museum are cognitive maps because they function as allegorical representations of a portion of CSULB. By displaying a sample of the population’s concerns, the project reflects the anxieties as well as the perseverance of the entire university. His visual disruption becomes a site in which the viewer can regain a sense of agency by simultaneously belonging to a community and potentially gaining a voice.

In Sick-Amour, Joel Tauber assumes the role of both director and pro-tagonist in the creation of a self-conscious documentary.30 In an ambivalent gesture towards “tree hugging” environmental activism, he appropriates the structure of this genre. Even though Tauber has employed some modes of “traditional” documentary styles, such as voice over narration and the inclusion of observational footage, his work may be considered a hybrid that has existed along the margins of the mode.31 Along these edges is the mockumentary, which in this case is formed out of the comical dimen-sion present in the absurdity of his desire to save a single tree.32 In one of

the four Sick-Amour videos, Xerxes, Watering, and Tree Guards, Tauber introduces humorous elements through his multiple declarations of love for the tree and his guerrilla style tactics whilst being questioned by police officers at the site. His film aesthetic does not provide a revolutionary model to save urban trees, but rather he provides documentation of his small-scale disruption and questions the viewer’s environmental responsibilities.

Tauber’s project has also drawn attention to issues regarding public institutions or municipalities, particularly within the City of Pasadena. He had to collaborate with officials working for the city and the Rose Bowl in order to affect change for a single tree, and then subsequently for all trees in Pasadena. By continuing this project through the planting of tree babies, Tauber points to larger socio-political issues, such as forms of legislation that protect natural resources placed within the urban setting. Individuals taking on the task of adopting a tree baby must look into their own community regulations concerning tree planting. This task compels the individual to learn more about their city, enabling them to play a more participatory role within their neighborhood.

In Fallen Fruit’s Neighborhood Infusions, the artists question the idea that there may be a unique quality or “essence” that makes neighborhoods distinguishable. There is a playful irony that exists in this work since it is not actually possible to capture the singular essence of a neighborhood in a bottle of vodka. Humor is juxtaposed with the serious reality of ever-changing communities that struggle with issues ranging from diversity to socio-economic hardship.33

In their Public Fruit Maps project, Fallen Fruit revisits past idealistic models by implementing smaller interventions that aim to create direct experiences for participants. This project further extends the group’s goal of educating the public about the accessibility to fresh fruit. Fallen Fruit’s various community projects include: fruit tree adoptions, where individuals must sign a contract to care for the tree and plant it in or over public space; neighborhood fruit forages, a gathering to pick ripe fruit; and edible fruit jams, an event for people to bring their home-grown or foraged fruit to create a collective fruit jam. By actualizing experiences and teaching

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skills, Fallen Fruit demonstrates how individuals can begin to analyze and understand the structure of their environment as they explore their own neighborhoods.

Utilizing the visual cues of intervention and engaging in cognitive map-ping, the artists in The Plains of Id activate communities by providing view-ers an avenue to understand the city and find their place within its extensive and complex cultural network. Sartre’s metaphor of L.A. as a mutilated earthworm impervious to death is indicative of the city’s humble origins and eventual growth into a multifaceted postmodern urban metropolis.

In its current state as a globalized cultural powerhouse, L.A. continues to develop into an entity beyond the individual’s perceptual capabilities. At the same time, this is often accompanied by the sense that one’s actions can have very little impact on socio-economic structures, on social injustices, or any construct tied to large-scale systems. However, to the artists presented in this exhibition this fact does not mean that one shouldn’t try. It is through the realm of the visual and perceptual that they attempt to reconcile the individual’s relationship with this postmodern metropolis by revisiting ideas of ownership and empowerment to all inhabitants of L.A.

1 Jean-Paul Sartre, “American Cities” (1945), in Literary and Philosophical Essays, trans. Annette Michelson (New York: Collier, 1962), 121.

2 The American journalist and California historian, Carey McWilliams (1905-1980), established L.A.’s status as the “great exception” in his book, Southern California: An Island on the Land (1946). There he compared L.A.’s unique urban structure to other settle-ments on the West Coast. McWilliams’ analysis of the city was ex-panded on by urban historian Robert Fogelson in The Fragmented Metropolis: Los Angeles 1850-1970 (1967). See Michael Dear,

“Los Angeles and the Chicago School: Invitation to a Debate,” City and Community 1, no. 1 (March 2002): 9-10.

3 British architectural historian Peter Reyner Banham (1922-1988) is also known for Theory and Design in the First Machine Age (1960). He wrote for various journals, including Architectural Review, Architects’ Journal, and New Statesman and Nation. In 1968 he became the first Professor of Architectural History in the United Kingdom at University College, London. Banham began teaching at the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1976, subsequently taking up the Chair of Art History at the University of California, Santa Cruz in 1980. See Reyner Banham, A Critic Writes: Essays by Reyner Banham, ed. Mary Banham et al. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996).

4 Banham uses Freud’s term, the Id, as a loose metaphor to colorfully describe this section of L.A. as a place where “the crudest urban lusts and most fundamental aspirations are created, manipu-lated and, with luck, satisfied” (Reyner Banham, Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies [New York: Harper & Row, 1971], 154). Furthermore, his categorical approach to analyzing the city mirrors Freud’s methodology of mapping the mind’s topography. According to Freud, the Id resides within the unconscious portion of the mind and its sole objective is to obtain satisfaction for all instinctual needs and drives regardless of the societal moral standards. See Sigmund Freud, The Ego and the Id (1923).

5 Banham, Four Ecologies, 154.

6 The term “basic Los Angeles Dingbat,” likely coined by Francis Ventre, can be described as a “two storey walk-up apartment-block developed back over the full depth of the site, built of wood and stuccoed over,” exhibiting basic characteristics of primitive modern architecture. Banham states that the dingbat is “the true symptom of Los Angeles’ urban Id trying to cope with the unprecedented appearance of residential densities too high to be subsumed within the illusions of homestead living” (ibid., 157-159).

7 Ibid., 154-155.

8 Peter Plagens, “Los Angeles: The Ecology of Evil,” Artforum, December 1972, 67–76.

9 Formed in the late twentieth century the members of the L.A. School included Southern California-based scholars like Mike Davis, Michael Dear, Steven Flusty, Roger Keil, Allen Scott, and Edward Soja, along with others. Together they greatly expanded the field of inquiry into L.A.’s urban structure. See Joe Day, foreword to the new edition of Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies, by Reyner Banham, new ed. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), xxi-xxiv.

10 Dear, “Los Angeles and the Chicago School,” 10.

11 Robert E. Park, Ernest W. Burgess, and Roderick D. McKenzie, The City: Suggestions for Investigation of Human Behavior in the Urban Environment (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1925). The European model is best exemplified by the city structure of Chicago, Illinois. Park and Burgess developed a distinctive program of urban research at the University of Chicago to examine this phenomenon. The group of scholars that formed around this investigation are commonly referred to as the Chicago School by which their theories is also named. Michael Dear uses their title in his essay, “Los Angeles and the Chicago School,” to create a debate between the Chicago city model vs. the L.A. model.

12 Richard S. Weinstein, “The First American City,” in The City: Los Angeles and Urban Theory at the End of the Twentieth Century, ed. Allen J. Scott and Edward W. Soja (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996), 24.

13 See Michael Dear and Steven Flusty, “Postmodern Urbanism,” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 88, no. 1 (March 1998): 50-72. Dear and Flusty describe the postmodern conditions of L.A.: “[t]he Los Angeles model consists of sev-eral fundamental characteristics including a global-local connection, ubiquitous social polarization, and a reterritorialization of the urban process in which the hinterland organizes the center” [50].

14 Taking many formats, the project includes a 33-minute documentary film, a 12-channel video installation in the shape of a tree, a series of photographs, and a number of permanent public artworks.

15 Schools, parks, museums, and other public institutions have adopted tree babies. Photos of planted tree babies can be seen on the artist’s website: http://www.joeltauber.com/treebabymap.html.

16 Access to Public Fruit Maps and information regarding other Fallen Fruit projects are available through multiple sources, including: http://www.fallenfruit.org/, http://www.facebook.com/FallenFruit, and http://twitter.com/fallenfruit.

17 For example, artists groups such as the Socialist Realists of Russia (1930s), used art as a means to demonstrate the plight of the working class. Ultimately their goals were rooted in the belief that art could revolutionize society creating a more equalized social structure. For further reference, see Oleg Sopontsinsky, Art in the Soviet Union: Painting, Sculpture, Graphic Arts (Leningrad: Aurora Art Publishers, 1978).

18 The SI were driven by the political crises of the early to mid-sixties in Europe. They sought to realize its critical strategies through political interventions. For further reference, see Guy Debord’s The Society of the Spectacle, trans. Fredy Perlman (Detroit: Black & Red, 1970); Hal Foster et al. “Situationist International,” in Art Since 1900: Modernism, Antimodernism, Postmodernism (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2004), 391-397.

19 Founded in March 1987, ACT UP consisted of various artist groups that used different media and techniques to create activist art. Works ranged from bold posters of appropriated images to

subversive re-workings of corporate ads. ACT UP used these strate-gies in order to call attention to governmental inaction and public passivity regarding the AIDS epidemic. For further reference, see Benjamin Shepard and Ronald Hayduk, eds., From ACT UP to the WTO: Urban Protest and Community Building in the Era of Globalization (London: Verso, 2002).

20 ASCO consisted of Los Angeles based Willie Herrón, Harry Gamboa Jr., Glugio Gronk Nicandro, and Patssi Valdez. “During a critical period in the evolution of the Chicano art movement, ASCO redefined Chicano mural art by wrenching the mural expression off the wall and reformatting it according to its own plastic terms” (George Vargas, Contemporary Chicano Art: Color and Culture for a New America [Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010], 29). Furthermore, they implement radical styles in a variety of media including video, multimedia performances, and installation art.

21 Claire Bishop, “Antagonism and Relational Aesthetics,” October 110 (Fall 2004): 54.

22 Michael Hardt and Kathi Weeks, eds., “Introduction,” The Jameson Reader (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2000), 4.

23 By “totality” Jameson means the immeasurable socio-economic context of the postmodern metropolis that is beyond the grasp of the individual. See Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism, ed. Stanley Fisher (Durham: Duke University Press, 1991), 51.

24 Fredric Jameson, The Geopolitical Aesthetic (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992), 3.

25 See Jameson, Postmodernism, 54.

26 Double gentrification references the two layers of displacement that occur by turning bars frequented by the residents of the Echo Park region who were both Hispanic and homosexuals into venues for upper-class patrons.

27 De la Loza defines the PRS as “a collective of artists, activists, and rasquache historians who reside in Los Angeles. Dedicated to systematic investigation of space, memory, and displacement, the PRS understands history as a battleground of the present, a location where hidden and forgotten selves hijack and disrupt the oppression of the moment” (“Taking Back the Plaque: The Art and Tactics of the Pocho Research Society,” Proximity Magazine,

http://proximitymagazine.com/2008/12/taking-back-the-plaque [accessed June 29, 2010]).

28 Sandra de la Loza, press release, “Echoes in the Echo: A Series of Public Interventions about Gentrification In and Around Echo Park,” June 27, 2007 (email communication with the artist, August 30, 2010).

29 For a more extensive discussion on Gran Fury, see Douglas Crimp, “Gran Fury talks to Douglas Crimp,” Artforum, April 2003, 70-71.

30 The definition of documentary film continues to be highly debated today because the “documentary” embodies a wide range of sub-genres or modes of moving-image media. Alisa Lebow argues that every definition of the term has proved partial and of limited use:

“none would venture to say that reality (much less the Real) is ever representable in any complete or unmediated way” (Alisa Lebow,

“Faking What? Making a Mockery of Documentary,” in F is for Phony: Fake Documentary and Truth’s Undoing, ed. Alexandra Juhasz and Jesse Lerner [Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006], 226).

31 Ibid., 19-20. Jesse Lerner characterizes these margins as the mo-ment when documentary comes into contact with fiction film. For further reference see the Introduction to F is for Phony.

32 Ibid., 228-229. Lebow offers some characteristics that are pres-ent within mockumentaries, such as the inclusion of parodies of documentary, or docudramas, that do not utilize parody or irony.

33 For example, the Guerrilla Girls (1985-ongoing) present feminist views in a humorous manner through various forms of media. This group of women artists is known for donning gorilla masks in public to conceal their identities while assuming names of dead women artists. For further reference, see Guerrilla Girls, Confessions of the Guerrilla Girls (New York: Harper Perennial, 1995).

Notes

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Artist Bios

Sandra de la Loza’s inter-disciplinary work explores the intersections of personal histories and the construction of collective memory. De la Loza confronts issues of accessibility by introducing new ways of experiencing and viewing art outside the gallery space, often utilizing public locations within the city of Los Angeles. Her work challenges the exist-ing social structures in L.A. by critiquing how historical hierar-chies are established within institutions. In addition to her art practice, de la Loza is the co-founder of Arts and Action, a space dedicated to generating artistic and political dialogue. De la Loza completed her M.F.A. at California State Uni-versity, Long Beach in 2004. Since then her work has been widely exhibited, most notably in Phantom Sightings: Art after the Chicano Movement, organized by the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) in 2008 and exhibited at various institutions through 2010. She was also included in the 2004 California Biennial at the Orange County Museum of Art (OCMA) (Newport Beach). Her work has been exhib-ited at Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE) (Los Angeles); LAX Tom Bradley International Terminal (Los An-geles); Craft and Folk Art Museum (CAFAM) (Los Angeles); 18th Street Art Center (Santa Monica); Japanese American National Museum (Los Angeles); Claremont Museum of Art (Claremont); First Street Studios (Los Angeles). Most recently her work was included in Siqueiros in Los Angeles: Censor-ship Defied at the Autry National Center (Los Angeles).

Patrick “Pato” Hebert is an artist, educator, and active community worker, utilizing a variety of media including: photography, installation, sculpture, language, light, tem-porality, and graphic design. Working collaboratively with public institutions, Hebert studies the social interactions of individuals and their environment, examining the spatial and ethical dynamics of communities. Presently, Hebert teaches in the Photography and Imaging Department at Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, and is the As-sociate Director of Education for AIDS Project Los Angeles. Hebert received his M.F.A. at the University of California, Irvine in 1999. His work has been exhibited in the U.S. in

solo and group exhibitions including the 2008 California Biennial at OCMA (Newport Beach); Angel’s Gate Cultural Center and the Port of Los Angeles (San Pedro); Stony Brook University Art Gallery (Stony Brook); University of Maine at Augusta (Augusta); Longwood Art Gallery (The Bronx); Oakland Museum of California (Oakland); Centro Cultural de la Raza (San Diego); and Plaza de la Raza (Los Angeles). Most recently his work has been included in Writ Large at the Pitzer Art Gallery (Claremont) and a solo exhibition, Inordinate Coordinates at the California Institute of Integral Studies (San Francisco). Hebert is the recipient of the 2010 Mid-Career Fellowship for Visual Artists from the California Community Foundation. His work has also been supported by grants from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Creative Work Fund, and the Durfee Foundation.

Joel Tauber works in many media including: video, photography, installation, and public intervention. His art explores elemental philosophical questions about our relationship to nature and the environment as a means of investigating empathy, ethics, and activism. By including himself in the work, Tauber critiques and adapts the genres of performance art and documentary film. Tauber is currently a Lecturer of Intermedia at the Uni-versity of Southern California, Roski School of Fine Arts. Tauber received his M.F.A. from Art Center College of Design, Pasadena in 2002. Currently, he is represented by Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects and the Adamski Gallery for Contemporary Art (Berlin and Aachen, Germany). Tauber’s work has been widely exhibited in solo and group shows throughout the U.S. and Europe, including: the 2004 and 2008 California Biennial at OCMA (Newport Beach); 18th Street Arts Center (Santa Monica); Crocker Art Museum (Sacramento); Gallery Saintonge (Missoula, MT); Miki Wick Gallery (Zurich); The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia (Nova Scotia); W139 (Amsterdam); Herve Loevenbruck Gallery (Paris). Most recently his work has been included in Cluster Balloons: From Lawn Chairs to Cosmic Rays at the Anderson-Abruzzo Albequerque International Balloon Museum (Albuquerque)

and No Matter. Failure and Art at the Kunstverein Hildesheim (Hildesheim, Germany). In 2010, his documentary film/love story Sick-Amour was screened at: the Downtown Film Fes-tival Los Angeles; San Francisco Documentary Film Festival; Hartford International Film Festival.

Fallen Fruit is an artist collective co-founded by David Burns, Matias Viegener, and Austin Young. In their col-laborations, fruit is the primary subject and material of their art. Through their exhibitions and projects, Fallen Fruit explores the presence of fruit in art history as well as its cultural and political symbolism. The collective utilizes various artistic forms: photography, video, public events or collaborative performances, public-service posters, installations, and murals. Through these media they analyze ideas of ownership, neighborhood, commu-nity, and new forms of self-identification within urban space. Fallen Fruit’s work has been exhibited throughout the U.S. and Europe including: LACE (Los Angeles); CAFAM (Los Angeles); 18th Street Arts Center (Santa Monica); Machine Project (Los Angeles); Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego (San Diego); Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles (Los Angeles); Netherlands Architecture Institute (Maastricht); InstantHERLEV Institute (Copenhagen). In 2010 Fallen Fruit exhibited at Intermediae at Matadero (Madrid), Biennial of the Americas (Denver), and presented EATLACMA, curated by Michele Urton at LACMA. David Burns received his M.F.A. from the University of California, Irvine (UCI) in 2005. He has also taught at several depart-ments at the California Institute of the Arts (Cal Arts) and the UCI Claire Trevor School of Fine Arts. Matias Viegener is a doctoral candidate at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is a writer, artist, and critic currently teaching Critical Studies and Writing at Cal Arts. Austin Young studied painting at the Parsons Paris School of Art and Design; he is a fine art photographer and filmmaker.

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The Plains of Id was made possible by the generous funding and support from the Department of Art, College of the Arts, at California State University, Long Beach (CSULB), and Associated Students, Inc., CSULB. The curatorial team wishes to express our appreciation of the cooperation and support of Christopher Miles, Chairman of the Department of Art, and the Fine Arts Roundtable for their generosity. A most grateful thank you is due to Christopher Scoates, Director of the University Art Museum (UAM), and his staff, especially Angela Barker, Shirley Brilliant, John Ciulik, Ilee Kaplan, Pet Sourinthone, Brian Trimble, and Sarah G. Vinci, for all their hard work and insight throughout the progression of the exhibition. Much appreciation is due to Doris Taylor and Cherlyn Comer for their invaluable assistance. We are grateful for the help from Lori McCoy, Edward Heider, Col-leen Ryan, and Steven Travig of CSULB Facilities Management for their collaboration on the outdoor installation. We would also like to acknowledge Brett L.Waterfield, Assistant Director of CSULB Student Life and Develop-ment; Carole Maclean of Print Media Services; Jody Baral, Art Department Chair, Mount St. Mary’s College; and CSULB University Library Starbucks for their donation of refreshments. We also appreciate the contribution of Kristie French, University Archivist and Records Manager, CSULB University Library, who permitted us to in-clude a first U.S. edition of Reyner Banham’s Los Angeles: The Architecture of Four Ecologies in our exhibition. The curatorial team is appreciative of the insight, generous cooperation, and artwork contributed by Sandra de la Loza, Patrick “Pato” Hebert, Joel Tauber, and the members of Fallen Fruit: David Burns, Matias Viegener, and Austin Young. We are grateful to Sasha Drosdick, Director of Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects for assisting with the loan of Tauber’s videos. We thank Tauber for his participation in the UAM at Noon event. A very special thank you is extended to William Larsen for his design of this brochure. We deeply respect the advice given by Dr. Karen Kleinfelder and Margaret Black towards the writing and design of the brochure. The curatorial team values the efforts of assistant curators Mary Coyne, Damaris Leal, and Hillary Morimoto for their thoughtful contributions to the essay included in this brochure and to the exhibition itself. We would like to sincerely thank Dr. Nizan Shaked, Director of the CSULB Graduate Program in Museum and Curatorial Studies, for her devoted leadership, enthusiasm, and support. Without her mentorship and guidance this exhibition would not have been possible. The Plains of Id was curated and organized by Jennifer Gardiner, May Ketpongsuda, Joan Mace, and Marielos Zeka in partial requirement for the CSULB Graduate Program in Museum and Curatorial Studies.

Pocho Research Society Pocho Research Society: Echo to Echo Installation, 2007, reinstalled 2011 From the series Operation Echoes in the Echo Mixed media, xeroxed maps, vinyl letters, photos Dimensions variable

Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) Public Fruit Maps, 2004-ongoing A sampling of four maps from the following Los Angeles neighbor-hoods: Echo Park, Larchmont, Sunset Junction, Long Beach 36 x 24 in.

Fallen Fruit (David Burns, Matias Viegener, Austin Young) Neighborhood Infusions, 2009 Installation containing six bottles of infused vodka on a wooden shelf 13.75 x 2.88 in. diameter

Pato Hebert Resilient Concerns, 2011 Outdoor installation with black and yellow construction flags Located on the CSULB, UAM lawn Dimensions variable

Pato Hebert Resilient Concerns, 2011 Indoor wall vinyl installation 144 x 264 in.

Joel Tauber Tree Baby, 2007-ongoing California Sycamore tree (offspring of the California Sycamore tree that Joel Tauber adopted in Rose Bowl parking lot, Lot K) Approximately 60 in. tall

Joel Tauber Sick-Amour: Xerxes, Watering, and Tree Babies, 2006 DVD: NTSC, SD, Widescreen (16:9) 5 min., 2 sec.

Joel Tauber Sick-Amour: Football, Money, and Garbage, 2006 DVD: NTSC, SD, Widescreen (16:9) 4 min., 11 sec.

Joel Tauber Sick-Amour: Tree Shrine, 2006 DVD: NTSC, SD, Widescreen (16:9) 8 min., 37 sec.

Joel Tauber Sick-Amour: Tree Babies, 2006 DVD: NTSC, SD, Widescreen (16:9) 9 min., 41 sec.

Department of Art • College of the Arts California State University, Long Beach 1250 N. Bellflower Boulevard Long Beach CA 90840 562. 985. 4376 • www.art.csulb.edu

UNIVERSITY ART MUSEUM College of the Arts California State University, Long Beach 1250 N. Bellflower Boulevard Long Beach CA 90840 • www.csulb.edu/uam

1 Sandra de la Loza Flat Top from Stoner Spots, 2008 Diptych, C-Print Approximately 24 x 48 in. ©Sandra de la Loza

AcknowledgmentsThe Plains of Id – Exhibition Checklist